Entertainment
lawyer Joe Calabrese, a 22-year veteran of O’Melveny & Myers, has become
managing partner of the firm’s 100-lawyer CenturyCity
office, the firm announced yesterday.

Calabrese
was also recently named to chair the firm’s Entertainment and Media Practice
Group. He represents producers, studios, independent film, television and music
companies, video game publishers, and financial institutions, and spent two
years in Europe
when the firm opened its London
office.

Last
year he represented the International Olympic Committee when it auctioned U.S.
broadcast rights to the 2010 and 2012 Olympic Games for $2.2 billion.

He
earned his law degree in 1981 at CornellUniversity
and his undergraduate degree at BostonCollege.

O’Melveny,
established in 1885, has 13 offices around the world, and employs more than 900
attorneys. In a statement, the firm’s chair, Arthur B. Culvahouse Jr., called
Calabrese a “terrific choice to head our preeminent CenturyCity
office,” citing his “service in many leadership capacities” and “strategic
practice in the entertainment and media industries.”

Culvahouse
is based in O’Melveny’s Washington,
D.C.
office.

Calabrese,
who assumed his new duties at the end of last month, said yesterday he is
looking forward to the challenge and plans to continue working closely with
lawyers in the firm who informally served his predecessor, David Weil, as
liaisons to the litigation and transactional wings of the office.

He
noted that one colleague outside the firm, to whom he commented that managing
100 lawyers might prove difficult, responded by email, “You don’t manage
lawyers, you lead them.”

Calabrese
said that is “a thought I’ll tuck away in the back of my head.” But he noted he
has served on the firm’s policy committee and has found that O’Melveny lawyers
do not generally require aggressive supervision.

He
said that he will make some adjustments in his practice commitments, but added:

“The
tradition here at the firm is that you juggle the responsibilities. At a firm
like ours, the clients come first.”

Weil,
who has become chief executive officer of Anschutz Film Group, will remain an
O’Melveny partner, the firm said.

Weil
served for the past year as an advisor to Philip F. Anschutz on film
investments. AFG is the parent company of two film companies that are O’Melveny
clients, Walden Media and Bristol Bay Productions (formerly Crusader
Entertainment).

Weil
has transitioned his client work to other members of the firm’s entertainment
and media practice, the press release explained.